Precious to Me
by Silent Angel
Summary: Introspective Sasuke; Still on the bridge after Haku and Zabuza die, Sasuke thinks about the day he saw Haku in the woods. Pairings: Best left to the discretio of the reader.


Sasuke stared at the body laying there – not Zabuza's but that of the boy Naruto and he had fought earlier. Without that mask, both the expressionless one that Sasuke imagined the boy's face wore when fighting and the clay outer one, Sasuke had no difficulty connecting the face of the boy before him to the visage of a girl in a pink kimono he'd met only a few days ago.  
  
~ Although he'd originally gone out to hunt down Naruto, Sasuke now followed a girl in a pink kimono with strange black designs decorating it. Something she had done had startled Naruto, and Sasuke was determined to discover what. Suddenly the girl disappeared – there was no moment where he looked away, the girl simply was gone.  
  
"Is he precious to you?"  
  
Sasuke's eyes narrowed as he turned, shoulder's tense, to face the owner of the voice. Sure enough it was the same girl. Sasuke studied her more closely now, mentally recording anything and everything he could about her. She had long hair, although it wasn't nearly as long as Sakura's, and wide, innocent eyes the same color as some brownies his mother had made once before – Sasuke looked away, shrugging. "Why?"  
  
The girl smiled, a beautiful thing that made Sasuke, just for a moment, forget his grudge against the girl. "When a person fights for one that is precious to them . . . that is when they can truly become strong. One can surpass their previous limits without difficulty if it is to protect that which is precious to them."  
  
The dark-haired genin shook his head. "It doesn't matter." He was beginning to regret coming after her – she was kind of strange. Hoping to change the subject before she could ask any more weird questions, he pointed at the designs on her kimono. "What so those mean?"  
  
"I don't know." The girl smiled. "There's a man that's precious to me, and he gave me this. I know it's valuable to him, so it makes me feel like I'm important to him that he lets me wear it." Not to be deterred from her previous questioning, she asked, "So what about that boy? Is he precious to you or not?"  
  
Sasuke tilted his chin up and looked away, arms crossed. "Of course not," he stated, glaring back at her. "I don't like guys."  
  
He blinked. She was laughing! At him! "What's so funny?"  
  
The girl chuckled a bit more before finally replying, "I don't mean it like that. A precious person could be a friend, a lover, or in my case, someone you look at as a brother." She turned away and began walking once more. "I guess you're right though. It doesn't really matter."  
  
She was gone before Sasuke could say anything back. ~  
  
Now, with the 'girl' once more before him, he could finally tell 'her' what he had wanted to that day in the woods. He could finally say that yes, Naruto was precious to him. Naruto was the only person who'd ever made him forget, even for a moment about Itachi and his own quest to not die. Only for Naruto would he have instinctively given up his own life, not remembering that he couldn't die yet until after it was too late.  
  
Sasuke smiled, the first one for a long while. Haku, the boy lying in front of him, didn't need to hear him say that. Haku had known is already, somehow, ever since that day in the woods, or perhaps even before.  
  
He glanced at Naruto as they walked away. It should anger him that the boy was still alive, without even a scratch after all that. After all, when he'd last seen him, the idiot had just recovered from a brief unconsciousness. Still, it made Sasuke feel something else, something he hadn't felt since his brother had. . . . He shook his head. Really, he hadn't felt this ever. His family had never paid too much attention to him, since he was just second rate to Itachi. Somehow though, Naruto made him feel it easily, as if it were second nature to Konoha's number one loud- mouth ninja. The knowledge that his 'death' had been enough to make Naruto become so much stronger that not only had he survived, but he's obviously done something to defeat Haku's Demonic Ice Mirror's. . . . The knowledge that he was precious to Naruto . . . made him feel important. Naruto was the first person to acknowledge him rather than the Uchiha, and it felt – it felt good.  
  
They reached to end of the bridge, where Inari and the villagers were waiting. Suddenly he and Naruto turned and ran back to Haku and Zabuza. They glanced at each other, surprised, but didn't hesitate. Sasuke picked up Zabuza gingerly as Naruto did the same for Haku. Together they walked off the bridge, the crowd parting before them. Kakashi nodded quickly at Sakura and followed at a slight distance, allowing the two boys to be alone. Something had happened in that mist, and he didn't want to interrupt it before it was finished happening.  
  
"Naruto. . . ." Sasuke started, but was interrupted.  
  
"He really loved him. . . . Do you think they'll be together still?"  
  
Sasuke paused, lost in thought.  
  
"Sasuke?"  
  
The genin nodded at Naruto and smiled, really smiled, for the second time that day. "They will be."  
  
Naruto grinned and continued on in silence, walking side by side with the boy he hated, to bury the two ninjas. 


End file.
